Thread by @WholePicture_

#Thread about #WashingtonDC #UnitedNations :

The residents of “DC”, as the city is popularly known, are American citizens and taxpayers, but have no voting representatives in Congress.

nzz.ch/pro-global/usa…

The one person who represents the capital as a delegate in the House of Representatives may speak but not vote.

Since the ratification of the 23rd amendment in 1961, the Washingtonians have only been allowed to vote in presidential elections and elect a minimum number of members of the Electoral College.

With around 700,000 inhabitants, more American women now live in the capital than in the fully fledged states of Wyoming or Vermont.

North Dakota and Alaska also have only a few tens of thousands more residents. In contrast to the "Washingtonians", these four member states each have two senators and at least one MP in the House of Representatives who are entitled to vote.

Two main problems stand in the way of the upgrading of «DC»: politics and the constitution.

To put it in a somewhat simplified way, the Democrats want to work with another member state to tap a reservoir of voters that is traditionally well-disposed towards them and that would earn them secure seats in Congress.

In their arguments for the revaluation, you can refer to the almost undivided popular will of the "Washingtonians", which is already expressed in the license plates.

The Republicans, on the other hand, don't want to hear about it, because the majority in the Senate in particular are often very tight, and two more votes for the Democrats could easily make the difference.

The opponents of the revaluation can also invoke the constitution, which stipulates in the first paragraph that the seat of government must be a special district, which must not be larger than ten square miles and is governed directly by Congress.

They claim that a constitutional amendment would be necessary for a revaluation. For this to happen, either both chambers of the Congress would have to adopt a proposal for an amendment by a two-thirds majority or two-thirds of the legislatures in the member states.

This would then have to be ratified by three quarters of the member states. A hotly controversial topic naturally has no chance with such requirements.

Surveys on the appreciation of the capital Washington (DC) between January and March

Pro upgrade = green
Contra appreciation = orange

by @NZZ

In February, however, Data for Progress found that 54 percent of those surveyed were in favor of a new constituent state, while 35 percent were against it.

As the name of the organization suggests, it does not pretend to be neutral, but stands by its "progressive attitude", that is, its proximity to the Democratic Party.

She was commissioned to carry out the survey by the Democracy for All 2021 Action Committee, which is also an emphatically progressive group.

The question about the upgrading of "DC" was packaged in a formulation that already made clear the thrust: Should the more than 700,000 inhabitants of the capital have the same rights to represent in Congress as the Americans in all other countries?

Under these circumstances, who would want to discriminate and say no?
But also in February the organization Rasmussen Reports conjured up the almost exactly opposite result from its sleeve, namely 29 percent for upgrading and 55 against.

This time, the respondents were reminded that the American Constitution expressly defines the capital as a government district and not as a member state. And who would want to argue against the constitution?

With surveys, you can achieve the desired result just by changing the questions.